Totally getting a handy tonight.
VEKTAL
The men have endless questions, as I knew they would. Will the women resonate for them? How many are there? What did they look like? Do they have mates of their own? Are the humans shaped like sa-khui women? “The differences are minor,” I tell them. “They have no tails, and their mouths are small, and they do not have fangs. They cannot eat meat fresh. They must cook it until it has no flavor.”
Someone makes a gagging noise.
“But . . . you resonated for her? She is small. Can she take you?” Salukh asks this, the biggest of our hunters. No doubt he’s picturing himself next to tiny Georgie and trying to fit himself into her. The thought makes me curiously angry. I know it is an innocent question—Salukh has never had a mate to share his furs. He keenly wants one.
I should share the information I have. Tell them that sliding into Georgie’s tight, wet cunt is like a dream. That she convulses and clenches around my cock when she’s feeling pleasure, just like our women. That her nipples are tipped with soft, textured skin and that they’re pink like her tongue. But it seems too intimate. As I look at Salukh’s avid gaze, though, I know he is hoping that one of the human females will make his khui resonate. Then he will be able to claim a mate and have a family, his greatest desire.
So I give them a few grudging facts. “She has fur in one other spot on her body. On her sex.” At the exclamations, I add, “And a third nipple.”
“Another nipple?” Raahosh asks, his voice curt. Disbelieving. “For young? Where?”
“Between her legs.”
He snorts, clearly finding this ridiculous. “She is deformed, and yet she will not accept the mating? She should be lucky to have you.”
His words infuriate me. I rise to my feet. “You speak out of bitterness, Raahosh,” I tell him. “You are jealous that I have resonated and your own khui remains silent after all this time. My mate is perfect in every way. It is not her fault that she comes from a place with different customs. In her land, they choose their mates.”
Someone mutters at this strangeness.
“Georgie will take a khui soon,” I tell them. She must. I cannot bear the thought of her declining it and leaving me to go back to her strange planet. The thought stabs me like a knife, and I fight back the agony it brings. “When she feels the khui within her resonate, she will know what it means to be mated. Until then, I court her with caresses and affection. Just because she does not resonate for me does not mean I shall treat her any differently.”
“Probably a good thing that she resonated for you then, Vektal, and not Raahosh. He’d have found her lacking,” Aehako teases.
Raahosh’s nostrils flare. He shoots me a cold look and then storms away from the gathering of men.
I rub my face wearily. I am glad to be home amongst my tribe, but my body aches for Georgie. I am eager to join her in bed. “I need hunters and supplies in the morning,” I tell them. “We go to rescue the other humans. Who will join me?”
Soon, I have a good group of hunters that have volunteered. It does not surprise me that they are all unmated males and young. The elder ones might be used to their solitude, but the others, like me, hunger for a mate. Young, brawny Salukh will go. Laughing Aehako. Quiet Pashov and his sibling Zennek. Hotheaded Rokan, who has a quick tongue but even quicker senses. Skilled Zolaya and grim, unsmiling Haeden, whose sad history serves as a lesson to others. I suspect that, come morning, Raahosh will show up and join us. He is an excellent hunter, for all his bitterness.
It is a good party. Maylak will want to go, but Kashrem worries that the trek is too far for her while carrying her kit. She will stay behind.
Once the hunters have been finalized, I give orders to find rations—blandly cooked and not spiced. Water skins for the human women. Warm foot coverings. Extra leathers. Blankets, as many as the men can carry. We will head straight from the humans’ strange cave-ship to a sa-kohtsk hunt. There we will get the women their khui.
Then, my Georgie will resonate for me. She will be safe, her life unthreatened by khui-sickness. Both she and our child will be protected from harm.
“Sleep,” I tell the hunters. “We will leave at dawn of the second sun.”
The men scatter, though I doubt any of them will be able to sleep. They will be dreaming of flat-faced human women with third nipples and welcoming bodies.
My own body hardens at the thought of Georgie, waiting in bed for me. I sprint to my cave, eager to see my mate again. Aehako calls out a jest, but I ignore it; I don’t care if I seem eager. Any unmated man would gladly trade his place for mine, and they know it.